Letter: Women should keep their maiden names

Monday, November 19, 2012

This is concerning your Election Day travails.

I think that women in modern times, especially professional women, should keep their maiden names. When women drop their maiden names in favor of their husband’s names, it is very difficult for former classmates and colleagues to follow the progress of their lives and their careers. You’re looking up Maggie Allen and she’s now Maggie Stevens, and if you were not close to her you may never have been informed of the change. So it would be much better if she remained Maggie Allen or became Maggie Allen Stevens. And of course keeping your maiden name would have helped with incidents like you described on Election Day.

When women were primarily housewives, it was fine for them to take their husband’s name. But now, with over fifty percent of working-age women in the workforce and with one in two marriages ending in divorce, taking the husband’s name just creates a lot of confusion and is counterproductive.